Rev. Dr. Ross Lockhart is Associate Professor and Director of the Centre for Missional Leadership at St. Andrew’s Hall. Ross serves as the Presbyterian Director of Denominational Formation at VST as well as an Adjunct Professor of Homiletics at St. Mark’s College, UBC.

Ross has a particular passion for shaping missionary disciples and “scholarly evangelists” for leadership in Christ’s Church for the sake of mending God’s creation. Ross is the author of Lessons from Laodicea: Missional Leadership in a Culture of Affluence, Gen X, Y Faith? Getting Real with God, co-editor of Three Ways of Grace – a collection of essays on the Trinity

In this episode, we talk about raising up missional leaders with passionate and healthy hearts and why the missional church movement still matters.

Welcome to episode 15of the Young Church Leaders Podcast with Grant Vissers!

Show Notes

Guest Links

Takeaways from the Episode

1. MISSIONAL CHURCH

The most important part of a service is not the sermon; it’s how we send people to be a witness for Jesus Christ in their world. Missional leadership is less about being a personal trainer to meet people’s needs but rather to equip them to go out into the world and be the church.

2. DIFFERENT OUTCOMES

We can measure attendance and how much many people put in the offering plate, or we can seek different metrics. We should be less concerned about measuring what’s happening in our buildings and more concerned with what our people are doing outside our church in how they behave years after they leave it.

3. SELF CARE MATTERS

In order to accomplish missional leadership, you must place a high value on self-care. Missional leadership is all about about living a life that is being the church out in the world with your whole life. But if your life isn’t being taken care of at a basic level it’s going to make it hard for you to teach people to be the church. Take care of your spiritual and physical health.

About The Author

Grant Vissers serves as associate pastor at St. Paul’s Leaskdale north of Toronto, Canada. He has his Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary. Grant is passionate about connecting with and helping other church leaders. He is married to Konnie, and together they enjoy hiking, camping, travelling and good music. In his spare time, Grant enjoys photography and exploring new places.